Common Ground

Common Ground

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“‘Think of all the stories you’ve heard, Bast. You have a young boy, the hero. His parents are killed he sets out for vengeance. What next?’

Bast hesitated, his expression puzzled. Chronicler answered the question instead. ‘He finds help. A clever talking squirrel. An old drunken swordsman. A mad hermit in the woods. That sort of thing.’

Kvothe nodded. ‘Exactly! He finds the mad hermit in the woods, proves himself worthy, and learns the names of all things, just like Taborlin the Great. Then with these powerful magics at his beck and call, what does he do?’

Chronicler shrugged. ‘He finds the villains and kills them.’

‘Of course,’ Kvothe said grandly. ‘Clean, quick, and easy as lying. We know how it ends practically before it starts. That’s why stories appeal to us. They give us the clarity and simplicity our real lives lack.’” (Patrick Rothfuss, The Name of the Wind)

This story is not one of the above mentioned stories. The Name of the Wind is a dark, gritty tale of vengeance. Kvothe is just a boy when his parents are killed by the Chandrien, mysterious beings who are rumored to be men cursed by magic. Through his adventures, Kvothe tries to find them, but something happens. When we first meet Kvothe, he is an innkeeper going by the name Kote, a simple man whose most notable ability is pouring drinks and cleaning his inn with his assistant Bast. Soon, the Chronicler comes to find out the truth about Kvothe. The rest is his past.

Pace: 3.5/5 stars – The book starts out slow, but once it starts, hang on.

Easy to understand: 3/5 stars – While the language is easy to understand, the book is fast paced and tends to jump from past to present with a few concurrent plot lines.

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